The mouthful will make its first appearance the night of May 23 and the morning of May 24. Peak activity is expected to be between midnight and 2 a.m. MDT.

What do these giraffes have to do with the Camelopardalids? A lot. Keep reading… (AP Photo, Stephanie Pilick)

All meteor showers are made up from bits of debris from comets and become visible as the Earth passes through the debris field. This time the field is made up of debris from Comet 209P/LINEAR. That minor comet, which orbits the sun every five years, was not discovered until 2004.

Some astronomers predict that all of the debris this comet has ejected between 1803 and 1924 could be in Earth’s path. That has experts predicting anywhere from less than 100 meteors an hour to an amazing 1,000 meteors an hour — more of a storm than a shower.

Total honesty here: The predictions of “1,000” were mostly made in 2012 or so. As the event has neared, most predictions have been scaled back to 200. Still, the experts admit that no one is sure of the numbers because we have never had a Camelopardalid shower before.

The shower will radiate from the constellation Camelopardalis, which is pretty much straight north: It circles Polaris and is near the two Dippers. Although the path of greatest visibility is farther to the east, Colorado should still get a show, weather permitting.

As an extra bonus, there isn’t much of a moon and what crescent there is doesn’t even rise until nearly 4 a.m.

Since you are wondering, “camelopardalis” comes from the Latin for “camel with markings like a leopard” — that is to say “a giraffe.”

(Romans didn’t see too many giraffes, although some did die in the arenas along with other exotic animals.)

Diana Shukis cleans the sidewalk in front of her Boulder home on April 23, 2013. Originally from Las Vegas, this is the first time she has ever shoveled snow. (Photo By Joe Amon, The Denver Post 2013 file)

This week opened with Tax Freedom Day — April 21. That is the day when the average person has earned enough to pay all their taxes for the year and can begin earning money for themselves.

In Denver, we look forward to Snow Freedom Day: The day when it is finally safe to go ahead and put the snow shovel in the shed (instead of a corner of the porch), and put the snow boots and heavy coats deeper into the closet.

April 26 is not quite that day, but it is a good passage point, because April 26 is the average date of the last measurable snowfall in Denver.

(Pause for cheers and groans depending on your hobbies and likes.)

Andrew Garcia with Jake’s Installers Fence and Landscaping shovels out the ice as he helps Boulder Police officer Steven Cast move a motorist stuck in the snow on 14th Ave on April 23, 2013 in Boulder. (Photo By Joe Amon, The Denver Post 2013 file)

That is a far cry from the latest recorded snow, of course. It has snowed in June in Denver, as long-time residents know. Officially, the latest snowfall in Denver was June 12, 1947.

We also should note, however, that snow has fallen in May in three of the past four years. Last year snow fell in May 2. It also fell on May 11 in 2011 and May 12 in 2010.

In their 31st year of issuing hurricane forecasts, the research team predicts an emerging El Niño event along with cooling waters in the tropical Atlantic Ocean should lead to decreased tropical storm activity — about 60 percent of an average season. Storm activity in 2013 was near 40 percent of the average season, the forecast said.

The moon looks red during an eclipse, as shown in this photo taken during the total lunar eclipse Dec. 21, 2010. (photo by Robert Grover)

If you are willing to stay up very late on Monday, April 14 (or get up really early on Tuesday, April 15) you can check out a lunar eclipse. Astronomers say this eclipse will begin just before midnight Denver time, and totality will last from 1:07 to 2:25 a.m.

Lunar eclipses have two big advantages over solar eclipses: 1) You can look right at them and 2) they can be seen from wherever you can see the moon rather than only being visible in a narrow track.

This eclipse is the first of several expected in the next two years. That’s because it marks the start of a lunar tetrad. A tetrad is when there are four successive total lunar eclipses — with no partial lunar eclipses in between — each of which is separated from the other by six full moons. So look for lunar eclipses on Oct. 8 this year; April 8, 2015 and Sept. 28, 2015.

A lunar eclipse happens when the sun, Earth and moon line up and the Earth’s shadow falls on the moon. As the Earth’s dark shadow begins to cover the moon, the moon will look red or reddish-brown. That’s why an eclipse is sometimes called a “blood moon.” (It looks red because of refraction of sunlight by the the Earth’s atmosphere.)

The idea of eclipses — and blood moons — can get some people excited. The eclipses in this particular tetrad coincide with the full moon marking Passover (April 15, 2014 and April 4, 2015) and Sukkot (Oct. 8, 2014 and Sept. 28, 2015).

A book published last year, “Four Blood Moons: Something is about to change,” by John Hagee argues that the tetrad is a sign of the end times as predicted in Joel 2:31. Other doomsayers point to the blood-red moon of Revelation 6:12, with the fact that the Earth and Mars were aligned last week as an added bonus.

However, it is worth noting that there will be eight tetrads this century. And that Passover is always marked by a full moon because it is based on a lunar calendar.

I will admit that we can go for 300 years at a time with no tetrads, though.

With rising temperatures arriving on the heels of nearly of foot of new snow Friday in the high country, the Colorado Avalanche Information Center has issued a Special Avalanche Advisory through the weekend.

The advisory, in effect until Sunday evening, urges extra caution for those traveling in the Summit County, Sawatch, Front Range and Grand Mesa zones. Temperatures in areas zones should reach the upper 30s to lower 40s by Sunday.

“Warm temperatures following a significant storm are often a dangerous combination that results in increased avalanche activity,” the advisory says. “Some of these slides will have the potential to step down deep into the snowpack resulting in a very large and potentially deadly avalanche.”

According to the CAIC, new snow followed by higher temperatures has caused several avalanches during the past several weeks.

“Travel cautiously this weekend and do not let spring fever lead you into making poor decisions,” the advisory concludes.

An avalanche Friday afternoon on Berthoud Pass buried three cars and closed U.S. 40 overnight. On Wednesday, a snowmobliler on Sharkstooth Peak near Durango was fully buried and remains missing. The victim has not been located, but is presumed dead by the CAIC due to the nature of the avalanche.

A total of eight people have been killed in avalanches this season in Colorado.

An evening thunderstorm rolled to the northeast through Denver in June 2011 (Daniel Petty, The Denver Post)

Unfortunately, tweeting photos of Colorado’s weather as it relates to your backyard patio furniture does not qualify you as a certified weather spotter. For that, you will need to attend an official Skywarn spotter training session, offered this spring by the National Weather Service.

Training sessions, available across Colorado from March through May, are free and open to the public. The 75-minute course will provide the basic instruction needed to be the National Weather Service’s certified eyes and ears in the field when severe weather strikes northeast Colorado.

Spotter reports help the National Weather Service in Boulder determine when and where warnings be issued when thunderstorms hit across the 22 counties they oversee.

NASA announced Tuesday that a 100-foot asteroid is expected to safely pass by Earth on Wednesday at a distance of about 217,000 miles — some 12,000 miles closer than average distance between the Earth and the moon.

The asteroid, officially dubbed 2014 DX110, should cruise by earth around 2 p.m. MST at over 33,000 mph, according to a NASA alert.

A new weather instrument in the works from a Colorado State University-led research team will help NASA study the climate in the upper levels of the earth’s atmosphere, specifically ice particles in clouds — information useful to improving global climate models.

The Tropospheric Water and Cloud ICE (TWICE) will be designed to weigh just over 17 pounds, small enough to fit in CubeSats, nano-satellites launched in conjunction with larger NASA satellite missions.

Once in orbit, TWICE will scan the upper troposphere measuring the size of ice particles and water vapor in clouds, collecting data to help researchers determine the effects of human-produced pollution on the climate. Dust, smoke from fires and general air pollution can influence the size of ice particles in clouds. When large amounts of these pollutants are present, clouds form smaller ice particles, resulting in less rain.

NASA awarded $4.5 million to CSU electrical and computer engineering professor Steven Reising for the project.

“There is a lot of uncertainty about the effects of air pollution on clouds and climate,” Reising said in a news release. “Our goal is to reduce this uncertainty to help improve climate predictions.”

UPDATE FOR THE RECORD: Flatiron Freddy did NOT see his shadow in Boulder. His colleague in Pennsylvania, however, saw his and predicted the standard six more weeks of winter.

————————————————

Just a quick note that, while the Broncos aren’t always in the Super Bowl, the second day of February is always Groundhog Day.

According to his posted schedule, Boulder’s “Flatiron Freddy” will make his annual appearance at 8 a..m. on Sunday at the Chautauqua Ranger Cottage at 900 Baseline Road. As reported last year, Freddy the marmot is beginning to show wear and tear from his years of service to the meteorological community. The feeling is that one of these years Freddy will have to be replaced by a a younger, fresher dead marmot.

In the cinematic tradition of Groundhog Day, the rest of this blog post is cut-and-paste from 2013. But we will eagerly await Sunday’s breaking rodent reports from Pennsylvania, Boulder and elsewhere.

As people note every year, Colorado does not have groundhogs, and is forced to rely on Flatiron Freddy, a yellow-bellied marmot who lives in Boulder.

OK, not LIVES actually. Freddy is stuffed. He was hit by a car many years ago and each year he makes (by necessity) a mechanical appearance. One year he drove up in a remote-controlled car and one year he popped up via strings. Last year, rangers hinted he might use a zip line but, alas, so far that hasn’t happened.

It is unclear whether Freddy even did any forecasting while alive. It is possible that the fact he was road kill actually helped him get the job. Although I found one clip that said he was “formerly a marmot“, I firmly believe that once a marmot, always a marmot.

This year (2013), Freddy saw his shadow — or would have if he was alive. It as the second year in a row he has given the opposite prediction from Punxsutawny Phil, his more famous Pennsylvania cousin. In 2012, there were shadows back East but not here. (It is more than a thousand miles away, after all.)

Others groundhogs competing for the spotlight include Sir Walter Wally in North Carolina and Gen. Beauregard Lee in Georgia. Most of them are alive, but Ridge Lea Larry, in upstate New York, is also stuffed, and the “groundhog” in Silver Point, Tenn., is a person in a rodent costume on a motorcycle.

Just to remind you, seeing the shadow means six more weeks of winter and no shadow means an early spring. Groundhog day is actually Candlemas, as mentioned in one old poem ….

If Candlemas be fair and bright,
Winter has another flight.
If Candlemas brings clouds and rain,
Winter will not come again.

The Germans call it Grundsaudaag and substituted groundhogs for hedgehogs after immigrating to America, according to some versions (or instead of badgers … or even bears … in others.)

P.S.: I found two mentions of Stormy Marmot on the web, who is based in Aurora — but both mentions were by Phil-loyalists who only mentioned him to put him down. I don’t know if he made an appearance this year.

UPDATE I received a email from Stormy the Marmot, who said he is attempting to find out why Wikipedia did not include his prediction this year. Stormy provided a link to his forecast (which calls for six more weeks of winter.)

AND ONE MORE UPDATE: Sorry to see that updated Daily Camera story reports that Freddy is “beginning to fall apart” having being chewed on by mice (his evil cousins) while in storage. Hang in there, Freddy.

Forecast Colorado is your place for the latest breaking weather news for Denver and Colorado, featuring the latest forecasts, road conditions and closures — with an occasional detour into meterological science, trivia and oddities.